Create grunge posters (part 1)

1. Select subject

Open up the file with your subject, and select it from the background, in this case, the eagle.

2. Copy the subject

Use the Refine Edge command to assess the quality of the selection. Hit Cmd/Ctrl+J to copy the eagle to its own layer

3. Incrase canvas size and move subject

Make sure the canvas is big enough for the picture, and position the subject just above the centre of the piece.

4. Add a textured surface

Download the texture from http://freestocktextures.com/texture/id/131. Use File>Place to load this into the composition, reducing its Opacity to 50%. Ctrl/right-click and select Flip Horizontal if need be. We’ve resized the texture so the centre of the cracked area is over the eagle’s talons: you could go for a similar effect yourself.

5. Rasterize and select

With Opacity back to 100%, go to Layer>Rasterize>Smart Object (In Elements, use Simplify Layer), then hit Cmd/Ctrl+Shift+U to remove all colour from the texture. Set its blend mode to Overlay, select the Magic Wand tool and set Tolerance to 15 with Contiguous unchecked. Next, select a dark area of the texture to make a selection.

6. Masked subject

Now click on the subject’s layer and hit Cmd/Ctrl+J. This will create a new layer containing a distorted version of it. Add a layer mask to the original eagle layer, then use the Brush tool to paint away all less important details; in our case, we’re going to just leave the head.

7. Lighten things up

Add the Brightness/Contrast adjustment layer (Layer>New Adjustment Layer) to the top of the Layers palette. Boost Brightness to +65 and Contrast to +10 to brighten the image.

Come back tomorrow for the second and final part of the tutorial!